The next morning we both got busy and didn’t really speak to each other- rather, I got busy while he slept in. For a guy without even a proper home and being tied up, he slept deeply. He awoke when I hit him in the face with his bag of stuff, but otherwise continued to sleep. I could appreciate his relaxed approach. And it made me significantly less nervous of him doing something in the night, though I would still keep my guard up just in case.
What I couldn’t appreciate is someone who constantly shifts and speaks in their sleep. I’m not a heavy sleeper, by necessity. Even though he was tied up in the living room all night, every time he would talk and move about in his sleep I would wake up. It was seriously annoying. Heck, the first time it happened I almost shot him because I forgot he was even there. The last time I almost shot him to end my suffering.
Although I was lacking sleep, I wasn’t idle. The first thing I did was sneak up and grab the guy’s phone. Course, Hidden Hands, Lethargic Presence, and Stalk helped me out, though it was probably overkill. He was lasered in on sleeping, so he didn’t even notice as I snuck back to my deck, uploaded the Alpha-Tres Worm to his phone as well as turned on the tracking software, and slipped it back into place as if nothing happened. It was insurance, nothing more.
I also took the time to go down and chat to my landlord. As it turns out, Feras had, in fact, been living here before I had the place. Nice to know he wasn't lying to me since day one, though that still wasn't enough to make me trust him fully. It did lower my suspicions of it all being an eidolonic setup though. It was purely coincidental... I hope.
After that, I pulled my hair into a ponytail and started to work on the device. I needed to finish it up, and soon. I was just having issues with the ADF receiver connecting to the antenna. It wasn’t as simple as setting a frequency and letting it go. As soon as it connected, the hydraulic would start moving at random, and I had no idea why it was happening. After several hours, I could confidently say it was a software issue and not a hardware one, which is just perfect.
Hours passed by as I swapped between surfing the Net for ideas, trying to do it myself, and taking breaks to rehash my plans. I also took the time to look over the blueprint of Ajay Insurance’s building. I memorized it at first glance, of course. Still, it helped to look at something. It gave my mind more space to analyze and work through alternative plans in case my current one went bottom up.
I was starting to get frustrated when I decided to take a break. I set down my deck, hopped off the counter, and threw some water into a prepack after removing the paper fork that came with it. After a few seconds, the heating element inside the prepack reacted with the water, and the ramen instantly heated up to a nice eating temperature. It was sooooo much nicer than eating cold and dry silage.
Just as I was about to start eating, Feras peaked his head in with a cute fox sprite wrapped around his shoulder. It had not materialized yet, so I ignored its presence as its fluffy fur swayed in a nonexistent wind. “Uh- hey, c-can I borrow one? I’ll pay you back!” He was back to acting out the innocent and cowardly boy.
I sighed and lowered the fork with a bite of somewhat delicious food on it. At least his presence wasn’t entirely a bother thanks to his sprite. “Just how are you going to pay me? You have a grift planned? And when?”
“I’m getting back in touch with my c-contacts for a gig… It’s been a month, so some of them are understandably weary about c-contacting me back…” He rubbed the back of his head, nearly hitting the fox, and a fragment of drained Aythryn citizen peeked through his timid boy act. Still couldn’t tell if it was a facade.
I stared at him for a time as my prepack steamed in my hands. “What happened? Anything that’ll blow onto me by proxy?”
“No!” He said. “Y-you don’t have to worry about that. It’s been taken care of…”
“Then at least tell me the story of the blood stain in my bedroom.” I said as I reached into the only non-empty cabinet in the kitchenette and pulled out a prepack.
His eyes snapped to it. “I uh… about a month ago, a couple gonks broke in and beat me up. The blood is where I half bled out.”
Note to self: get better locks on the door- who am I kidding? If someone wanted to break in, a little lock wouldn’t do anything. It was incredibly easy to lockpick such a thing, and even the dial ones weren’t safe. I knew from a lot of personal experience in B&E just how easy it was to get through them.
I would have to splurge and get a high-end system if I wanted true protection… but then my apartment would be marked as having something of potential value due to the stronger security. True protection came in either looking too poor to be worth the effort, or having far too strong protection to be worth the effort. Still, as evidenced by the growing merc field, strong protection isn't even all that good anymore.
I tossed him the pack. “Then you also need to buy the cleaners to scrub out the blood when you get more money.”
He looked at me like I was a monster as he turned up his innocent boy act to the max. Even the fox looked at me oddly. “Um… o-okay… I need to go in a bit to get the a-actual clothing for the uniform. You’re kinda short, so-”
“I’m perfectly normal! I just- just haven’t hit my growth spurt yet…” I slouched down against the counter. Any day now it would come. My diet was even better, so surely I’ll gain some height… at least an inch? Please? I’ll take a few inches over a Skill Point if one of you wants to offer me one! Can the eidolons even hear my thoughts? Or is it more of a vocalization thing?
“Riighhht… A-anyway, I’m assuming we don’t have money?”
“Not yet.” My mind shifted from my height to a less depressing topic. The only thing worse than realizing you were broke was a broke calling you out on it…
He backed up with the prepack. “Chek… I’ll, ahem, acquire it. Enjoy your meal.”
I did, indeed, enjoy my meal. During that time, I surfed around the Net and checked out guides on how to do stuff regarding hand-to-hand combat. It would be a nice Skill to have at least my toes dipped in. I was better off getting trained by Uncle Ezra or Mira, but it at least got me used to seeing the motions. After that, I quickly returned to work.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
After a few hours, in which Feras returned at some point, I finally had a breakthrough. It took hours before I finally found something that helped me on an ancient site. Apparently, the reason my setup failed was thanks to ambient interference scrambling the signals. It didn’t offer a solution, but at least I had a potential cause for my problems.
Shortly after some focused research, I found a solution; frequency hopping. It was something first used way back during one of the old world wars. Basically, the carrier frequency for my signal would rapidly switch between a wide band of frequencies in a preset pattern and act like a password. This way, only my commands would reach the receiver and the ambient interference wouldn’t bother it.
The issue arose thanks to the fact most remote systems had frequency hopping built into them for ease of access since ADF naturally had a lot of ambient disturbances. I had bought cheap though, and cheap had shot me in the foot. Funny how that works.
It took a while to set it up, especially considering I was using copy-pasted spaghetti code I barely understood the function of. After several hours trying to get it all set up through trial and error, I sent a test through. I watched the hinge like an excited fox as it slowly started to push out of its cylinder and the firing pin made a light tap against the table.
I nearly shouted with joy as I played around with the signals and moved it about. An intense surge of satisfaction coursed through me as I looked at my newest toy. Sure, it wasn’t elegant and there were definitely better things out there, but I made it myself. It was incomparable in my heart.
The little guy was just missing a single thing: a name. I played with it for a while as I tried to figure out what to call it. At long last, something came to mind as I watched the firing pin hit the table repeatedly: tapper.
With all that figured out, I redrew the schematic in my journal and hammered in the details as I labeled it. I spent the rest of the night making two more tappers just in case.
Feras stopped me just before I hit the sack. He was holding the uniform, which looked stunningly similar. I couldn’t tell much of a difference between it and the real clothing. The patchwork, it being the company's logo of a blue bird wrapped around a terminal, looked incredible. The guy had some talent at the very least.
“It’s not done yet.” Feras said as he handed it to me with a drained expression.
I arched an eyebrow at him and looked it over. “What’s missing?”
He wearily pulled out his phone and showed me a picture of an Artoras employee. “The badge. I don’t have the resources to make one.”
“Okay… what are you missing?”
“A lot of things. It’ll be a couple hundred Rayn to get everything back to make this kind of stuff flawlessly.” He zoomed in on the badge. “Corps are starting to make IRF-coded badges to prove they’re real. I can’t replicate that without some specialized equipment.”
This was news to me… what are the chances he’s lying to me? Hmm… not very high. It does sound like something a paranoid corpo would make to stop the very thing I’m trying to do. Especially if it was an IT or security corporation. “I’m as broke as you… Can I run without it?”
“No. Did you see that box behind the receptionist's desk?” He scrolled through the images on his phone.
“Yeah.” I thought it was weird back then.
He stopped on an image and showed it to me. It was a similar-looking device. “It’s not exact, but close enough. Chances are high it's an IRF reader… the fact they have one in the first place is weird. That kind of tech hasn’t made it to the smaller corps yet. Most likely, they’re paying for Artoras’s high-end package.”
I frowned as I leaned up against the wall of my apartment. Part of me wanted to stay suspicious about this IRF coding, but he would know better about this kind of thing since his job is going in the front. If only I was more confident in my sneaking Skills... “Is there a workaround?”
“How good are you at pickpocketing?”
The next morning, after kicking Feras out to take a shower, I drove as close as I could to Artoras’s headquarters on the northernmost edge of Old Town. The building was sandwiched between the ‘historic’ buildings of Old Town and the newer ones of Downtown.
Feras had stayed behind to sleep in once I let him back into the apartment. I was weary about leaving him behind in the apartment by himself, but the worm and tracking software in his phone gave me a small amount of confidence. I checked the Mapp™ in my hud and saw him still at my apartment building. Good.
I already had on the uniform of the group. It was essentially a custom white button-up shirt and slacks. The symbol of the corporation was sewn onto the slacks and shirt. The corp thankfully didn’t seem to be too strict on extras. Several of the pictures showed them wearing hats, jackets, blazers, and other assorted ‘extra’ pieces.
I pulled my baseball hat, go Aythryn City Slashers, from my saddlebag and put it on. I also snagged a small lighter and a half-empty box of cigarettes I kept for a rainy day. Then I followed along with foot traffic to Artoras’s massive glass front entry and checked it out as I walked by.
The place was designed like a massive U with arms of balconies and offices surrounding a drop to the lobby. ‘Course I already knew that thanks to Eidetic Schematic and the city’s directory, but it was good to get a visual.
A gaggle entered the building, mostly splitting into two. What looked to be employees headed toward the interior of the building blocked by armed security, metal detectors, and card readers. The other group, clients probably, headed to a reception area.
I could sneak in the front, but it wasn’t exactly my style. Instead, I headed to a side alley of the building to follow a tried and true method of mine. The roads in the alley were far more worn out than the main ones, and little pools of water were everywhere. Even back here, away from the mainstream streets, there were occasionally bits of neon reflecting upon those pools as the rain slowly drizzled down.
My head kept low to block my face from most of the camera’s around and my hand stayed tightly wrapped around the Sidewinder just in case. I fingered the lighter in my other hand as my feet carried me around back, spotting the Artoras HQ fire exit smashed between several dumpsters. A small piece of asphalt was placed by the door.
This area wasn’t exclusive to the pools of water building up. Floating in said pools were little cigarette buds. Most were random brands of synth-tobacco cigarettes, each promising to be better than the last while probably bringing increasingly dangerous effects. Heck, there were even quite a few Tosta ones.
One kind in particular stood out. It was red and black instead of the usual brown and white. Printed on the paper was a laughing skull wearing a jester’s hat; the Neo-Jokers. Someone around here appreciated real tobacco.
Seeing as no one was there, I pulled a cigarette out and cut off a quarter before lighting it up. The area was obviously where several smokers came, and probably a camera dead zone to boot. No way they went somewhere where they could be recorded smoking instead of working.
I hung outside for several minutes, waiting patiently with my nose wrinkled toward the stench of cigarettes. After a period of time, the door creaked open and a man poked his head out. Immediately, the cigarette flicked from my hands to a puddle and I put on a ‘guilty’ expression.
The man wore a rather fancy suit. Exec, maybe? He chuckled and propped the door with the chunk before heading out with a cigarette of his own. It was one of the fancy Neo-Joker ones. “You new here, kid?”
“Y-yes sir.” I stammered and put on a worried look. I may not be a grifter, but this level of acting was rather easy.
“Got a light?” He held the cigarette out to me.
I fumbled for the lighter thanks to my ‘nerves’, and pulled it out. I held it aloft and lit the guy’s cigarette. He nodded to me and took a long drag of his cigarette, letting out a breath full of smoke. I edged around him and headed for the door-
“Hey, kid!” The guy called out to me.